


one single thread of gold tied me to you

by ivyrobinson



Series: dolly [1]
Category: Anastasia (1997), Anastasia - Flaherty/Ahrens/McNally
Genre: F/F, Law School AU, background dimya, saw it on a tumblr post
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2020-08-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:02:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25668655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivyrobinson/pseuds/ivyrobinson
Summary: dunya gets partnered with paulina on a project and panics. based on a tumblr post.
Relationships: Dimitri | Dmitry/Anya | Anastasia Romanov (Anastasia 1997 & Broadway), Dunya/Paulina (Anastasia Broadway)
Series: dolly [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1861222
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	one single thread of gold tied me to you

**Author's Note:**

> specfically [this tumblr post](https://lawishbaaby.tumblr.com/post/179816466104/badbts-sarahkeilman94-sarahkeilman94-i-got)

Dunya was trying hard to focus in law school. She’d busted her ass through high school to get into college with minimal assistance from her Aunt and Uncle and the government and then worked all the way through university to be able to do the same for law school. And she’s done an admirable job of it thus far. 

Until now. Until Paulina Laskin. Polly was smart, pretty and sat three rows in front of her and to the left. The swooshing of her ponytail was constantly catching Dunya’s attention as she tried to focus on the lecture happening. Even worse, based on the few times they’d interacted, Polly was nice. 

And then they’d been paired up on a project, and Polly’s made a stupid corny joke about being partners in crime, her fingers coming around to tap on Dunya’s wrist as though it were a button set to make the pace of her heart quicken. And she’d taken Dunya’s phone with ease, typing her contact information in and labeling herself as Partner in Crime and sending a text to herself so she’d have Dunya’s. 

She’d texted Dunya fifteen minutes earlier, asking if she wanted to meet up at the nearby café to go over notes, and her throat had gone dry and she didn’t know what to do. 

So instead of responding, she’d requested a FaceTime to her best friend Anya, whose boyfriend Dmitry had answered and taken one look at Dunya’s frazzled expression and immediately gone into the kitchen and handed off the phone to Anya before taking over for whatever Anya had been making. 

“I’m weak,” she announces once Anya has shut herself in her bedroom. 

“I’m aware,” her best friend responds without missing a beat, trying to get out a spot of flour on her cheek. “But continue.”

“Remember how you asked me if there was anyone I was interested in?” Dunya begins, twisting the ends of her hair with her fingers. 

“And you got all flustered and lied and said no?” Anya asks. “Yes, I remember.” 

Dunya scowls. “So okay her name is Polly and she’s just really pretty and nice and now we have to do this project together and she wants to meet up with me at a café.” 

It takes Anya a moment to process all of that, as it’s come out in a rush. “Okay, and what did you tell her?” 

“Nothing,” Dunya sighs. “I panicked and called you.”

“Meet up with her!” Anya encourages, because Anya’s never thought twice about going after what she wants. “At worst, you’ll have a new friend.” 

“I’m going to fail out of law school if I have to work with her,” Dunya complains. 

“You survived having to live with your Aunt and Uncle and still graduated with great grades,” Anya points out and there’s a click of the door and she assumes Dmitry has walked into the room. She doesn’t mind, she’s long accepted Dmitry as an extension of Anya. “Does she like girls?” 

Due to the somewhat extensive social media stalking Dunya has some of her, she does know the answer to this. She stared so long at the Facebook information saying Interested In: Women for so long she can still see it sometimes when she closes her eyes. 

“Yes,” she says and prepares herself for more encouragement. 

“Then you should absolutely be at that café,” Anya demands. “You’re so smart, and so kind, and so hot. Don’t you think so Dima?” 

Dmitry appears in the screen, bending down to see her. “Definitely the most of all those things of anyone else I know in law school.”

Dunya rolls her eyes, “You two are useless.” 

“If you didn’t want someone to tell you to go for it,” Anya points out as Dmitry kisses her cheek before disappearing again. “You wouldn’t have called me specifically.” 

“You’re my best friend!” Dunya protests. “I would always call you first.” Anya just arches an eyebrow at that. “Ugh, fine. I’ll tell her I’ll meet her, but it’s going to be purely academic.” 

Anya laughs, “I used to tell my grandmother the same thing about my study dates with Dmitry.” 

She lets out an exasperated sigh. “I’ll talk to you later.” 

“Follow up with me or I will social media stalk her myself to see what she’s like,” Anya warns. 

Dunya doesn’t dignify that with a response and instead ends the call, switching back to Polly’s text to say yes, she’s available to do that if she’s still free. 

A part of her hopes that Polly’s made other plans by now but she doesn’t even have time to contemplate that because Polly’s already responded saying she just got there and will save Dunya a seat if she wants to head over. 

She decides against changing her clothes, and just runs a brush through her hair and grabs her laptop and goes. 

Polly closes her laptop and jumps up and hugs Dunya in greeting, as though they were lifelong friends instead of classmates for the past several weeks. She smells like lilies and it takes Dunya a more few moments too long to process anything else. 

Then she sees the cup in front of the empty seat, “What’s this?” 

“London Fog,” Polly responds, sitting back down. “It’s what you bring to class, right? You always have the little blue earl grey tag sticking out.” 

“I do,” she’s a bit dazed that Polly’s noticed, given they had only spoke a handful of times before now. “You noticed that?” 

Polly flushes, her pale skin creeping pink, “A good lawyer notices everything.” 

Dunya sits down, taking a sip of her drink which may be the best drink she’s ever taken of her life. “Should we start by going over notes?” 

Polly nods but stops her with a hand against her arm when she goes to take out her laptop. “The table is small, we can just share mine and I’ll send you the document link after?” 

“Ok,” Dunya says, because she can’t think of a reason not that’s not ‘your hair is down for once and if I sit too close to you I’ll want to run my hair through your ringlets’ and it seems weird and creepy to admit that at a study session. 

She scoots her chair over so she’s sitting next to Polly, who has a document up already full of notes. 

“I like to break things down by categories,” she tells her, as though slightly embarrassed by the intensity of her organization. 

“No, it’s great!” Dunya says, and then inwardly cringes at the level of enthusiasm she gave that and tries to dial it down. “Sorry, I’ve never had to do a project with someone who actually put in work before.” 

Polly flashes a bright smile over at her, her hand presses against the top of Dunya’s, “I think we are going to get along famously, Dun.” 

Dunya works through her fluster because Polly’s hand is still atop of hers, “Thank you?” 

She wrinkles her nose when she laughs and then starts talking through the paragraphs she has already outlined, her text book turned open to their assigned section. 

Her hand doesn’t move and halfway through the study session, Dunya turns her palm up and Polly’s stays there, her fingers lacing with hers. 

She can’t breathe but she can kind of focus on the project and even when they pack up to leave, walking out of the cafe, their hands stay intertwined. Even when they get back to Dunya’s dorm, Polly saying it’s on the way to the building where she lives, their palms stay pressed together, and she doesn’t let go when they get to her door and Polly brushes her lips over hers in a whisper of a kiss. Only then is her hand free, but her heart leaves with Polly.


End file.
